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Why big data is attracting big attention

If there’s one pop culture reference for the rise — and value — of data in our culture, it’s Moneyball. The film — based on a book, and a true story — follows Brad Pitt in the role of an analytics-obsessed baseball general manager who orchestrates a winning streak for a pathetic team, and revolutionizes the game by making big calls based on player data.

So Murat Kristal — a data researcher and professor at the Schulich School of Business — knew where to turn when making his pitch to launch a master of business analytics program in 2012.

“I took the DVD sleeve of Moneyball, and that was the presentation,” he says.

“I’m not joking.”

Standing in front of an advisory board, Kristal told the Moneyball story.

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“See how they changed the game of baseball?” he asked the room of academics. “Our students can change the business environment.”

A similar argument has been made on campuses across the country in the last few years, where a new kind of MBA and executive program is responding to demands for a new kind specialized business graduate: the data strategist.

Increasingly, companies are struggling to make sense of the dramatic rise of data available them — everything from tracking consumer behaviour online to tracking their own people, processes, products or machinery. Moneyball is based on the 2001 baseball season. Since then the amount of data has exploded. According to IBM, 90 per cent of data were created in the last two years alone. And the speed at which we can process that data is similarly enormous.

But in business, as in baseball, numbers aren’t enough. You need someone who understands the company, the industry and the game to turn digits into insight, and ultimately competitive advantage.

“Companies have a pressing need for talent in the area of analytics,” adds Yuri Levin, director of Queen’s University’s part-time master of management analytics program.

“They don’t need a statistician,” says Kristal, director of Schulich’s year-long program. “They need someone who can read the business process, create a solution, do the analytics and communicate the results.”

The Schulich program has a 100 per cent internship placement for the roughly 20 to 30 students accepted, a 20 to 25 per cent acceptance rate, and students with GMATs averages in the 650 to 700 range. At Queen’s, the 60 students in the most recent cohort beat out an application field 500 deep.

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Companies including IBM, Deloitte, Scotiabank, and Labatt are providing input and feedback on Schulich's program. At Queen’s, the list includes Rogers Communications, Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, Mastercard Advisors, and Loblaws Companies.

Students attending Concordia University’s executive course on analytics include professionals from KPMG, Air Canada, WB Games and Morgan Stanley.

“Senior managers, directors and VPs come to the program and learn how to leverage analytics to make their decisions,” says Concordia instructor Jean-Paul Isson, an international expert in big data and analytics, author of Win with Advanced Business Analytics: Creating Business Value from your Data, and global vice-president of business intelligence and predictive analytics at Monster Worldwide, Inc.

The program teaches them how to decide what kind of analytics could help a certain problem, what kind people they need to build an analytics dream team, and how to integrate analytics into an organization from the ground up.

The demand for business analytics specialists is expected to reach 1.5 million by 2018 in the U.S. (according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics), which translates into about 150,000 jobs in Canada.

Lisa Huang, 28, was working in analytics on employee fraud and asset protection for Shoppers Drug Mart, when she realized she wanted to find work at a more strategic level.

“I’m not looking for a role where I’m sitting in front of a computer, creating a model,” says Huang, who will graduate this year from Schulich. The program emphasizes a blend of business and technical skills, including being able to deliver a presentation and translate technical material into everyday language.

A month into an internship with Aimia, which runs Aeroplan, Huang was offered a full-time job as manager of client analytics.

“If you can earn Aeroplan miles at Esso, then Esso would be a client,” she explains. She helps different retail operations attract Aeroplan members, or retain those they have.

“I love it,” she says. “Every day, what you do translates into analytics strategy and company strategy and their vision going forward.”

But business analysis is about far more than what Murat calls “an amazing marketing term,” and one that’s received backlash for being little more than a buzzword.

Levin at Queen’s takes the example of the airline industry. At first, data analytics gave airlines a competitive advantage.

“Now, it’s basically a cost of entry in the airline industry,” he says. “If you don’t employ revenue management and dynamic pricing, you can’t survive.”

Soon, says Levin, it will be the same no matter what kind company you run.

“At some point, analytics will become a cost of entry to all businesses.”

Big Data is big business

● Every day, we create 2.5-quintillion bytes of data.

● 90 per cent of the data in the world today has been created in the past two years.

● Every minute, 100,000 tweets are sent globally.

● Google receives two-million search requests every minute.

● Five-billion mobile phones were in use in 2010.

● 30-billion pieces of content are shared on Facebook every month.

● By one estimate, there will be 5,200 gigabytes of data for every human on the planet by 2020.

● By 2015, 4.4-million IT jobs globally will be created to support big data, generating 1.9-million IT jobs in the United States alone.

● 70 per cent of data is created by individuals – but enterprises are responsible for storing and managing 80 per cent of it.

● Big data will drive $232 billion in spending through 2016.

● There is the potential for a 60 per cent increase in retailers’ operating margins with big data.

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